Leading voices in the matter of the Aral
Sea have tended in recent years to be harshly
conservative and very old line or angry and
demanding of reform. If Viktor Dukhovnyi
speaks for the former, then Raushan Tulia
gakov, a novelist and member of the Com
mittee to Save the Aral Sea, and Nikolai
Aladin, of the Leningrad Zoological Insti
tute, do the same for the latter.
Said Tuliagakov: "We knew the problem
as far back as 1960, but we were not allowed
to speak out. When we did, the bureaucrats
crucified us." And Dr. Aladin, who is
researching the reintroduction of crustaceans
into the Aral, said: "As soon as we destroy
the present complex of water management,
we will make progress with the Aral Sea."
present level is to be stabilized, the Aral
Sea will need half again the 21 cubic
kilometers of water a year to be gained
by the year 2005. The amount will not be
obtained from the rivers unless a decision is
made to reduce by half the nearly 18 million
acres now under irrigation in the basin.
"We could do that today-cut it in half.
But we have to think of the people who
depend on the irrigation for work. What will
they do then? What will they eat?"
Polad A. Polad-Zade sat in his Moscow
office and made an accounting for all the
river waters. As first deputy minister in the
Ministry for Water Management Construc
tion Projects, he is in a position of authority.
In talking with Polad-Zade and Dukhov
nyi, it became clear that they intend to
work for a solution giving priority to the
people who depend on the irrigation. They
know that the Aral is not likely to be, ever
again, what it was before, and that the best
that can be hoped for is some sort of stabili
zation of the sea and survival of the deltas of
the two rivers.
Aral Sea expert Philip Micklin also feels
that the price for restoring the sea may be too
high. "Just to stabilize it would require an
immediate injection of 30 to 35 cubic kilome
ters of water. I can understand the feeling
that attention should focus on the deltas."
Saving delta lakes and restoring some of
those now lost could lead to new commercial
fishing activity and to the restoration of ani
mals such as the muskrat. The watery mazes
once supported large populations of boar and
Quenching his thirst, this schoolchild
and others ofthe Muynak district are
happy for every drop of potable water.
Victims of the great blight surrounding
their beloved Aral Sea, they-more
than most-can appreciate the Central
Asia adage: "Water is life."
deer. But most of the animals are gone now,
even the egrets that applauded the show
with great claps of wings.
There is still some talk of a grand scheme
to bring new water to the Aral by a diversion
from the Ob and Irtysh Rivers in Siberia,
1,500 miles away. Environmentalists in the
Soviet Union, for the most part, are opposed
to altering the rivers, saying that this can
only compound environmental problems.
So the Aral continues to give itself to the
sun and take little in return. Dr. Micklin has
looked beyond the year 2000 when, if noth
ing is done, the end for the sea will arrive.
"That does not mean there will be nothing
left at all," he said. "The worst scenario
would probably find the Aral shrunken to an
area of 4,000 to 5,000 square kilometers, as
compared with the present 40,000 [15,500
square miles]. Two lakes would remain in
the south, both four or five times as saline as
the open ocean. Both would be dead, like,
well, the Dead Sea."
Who then, with the sea like that, will ever
want to remember it in verse, as Matthew
Arnold did in his epic work "Sohrab and
Rustum":
The shorn and parcelled Oxus
[Amu Darya]strainsalong
Through beds of sand and matted
rushy isles
Oxus, forgetting the brightspeed
he had
In his high mountain cradle
in Pamere,
A foiled circuitous wanderer:
till at last
The longed-for dash of waves is
heard, and wide
His luminous home of waters opens,
bright
And tranquil,from whose floor
the new-bathed stars
Emerge, and shine upon the Aral Sea.
Ah, Matthew, if you could see it now.
]
National Geographic, February1990